Samsara: The Bride
by Miss Slaughter
Summary: She dreamt as Rocha had shown her, black rock, she dreamt of twisted scaly bodies nestling in the deep dark warmth of the planet's core, she dreamt of flame and the Bride dancing on a giant pyre that was the ruins of the world.
1. Prologue

Prologue:

_Do you know what it is to be alone?_ Alex Burrow's eyes opened to perfect darkness. Perfect silence. Perfectly alone. The world began to penetrate her senses slowly, as she lay half dead in the Tropicana Resort 12th floor suite. Slumped like a junkie half across the chaise lounge, clothes crusted in dried blood.

Her memories were distorted, disjointed, vivid flashes of his fingers sliding up her thigh. "This belongs to me." He growled in her ear.

She gurgled incomprehensibly.

His mouth at her throat, teeth slicing through her skin, hot, stolen blood swelling on his tongue. "It's all mine."

Immense Power and age coursing through every cell, oppressing, suffocating her. What he said was true. She was his as and she was him in many ways and that's why she lay there like a neglected rag doll.

He was gone now. Long gone. She would have to leave too. People were coming. She could smell the metallic clink of keys, taste the static of polyester suits and plastic of name tags.

Each attempt to move was a slow ache and burn in her joints and organs. She moved sluggishly, rising to her feet feeling her ankles quiver with the weight of her body. She was weak from lack of reality, her psyche knotted and gnarled, half stuck in another world.

The polite knock at the door was like thunder to her ears. _Knock. Knock. Knock_. "Excuse me, sir?" _Knock. Knock. Knock._ "Sir, can you open the door, please."

Alex dragged her feet to the balcony, the burst of hot, oppressive desert air greeted her, grated against her sensitive skin. Even as the hotel manager and maintenance men burst into the room she threw herself off the edge.

Falling.


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter One:

The sights and sounds of the city made Alex Burrows delirious with wonder. The hotels were a glittering oasis amidst the vast desert. Unbearable heat nipped at her skin like microscopic, ravenous insects trying to destroy her one cell at a time.

She haunted the strip like a wraith, a shabby child with bloodstains on her clothes. Dusty and sick she walked with her head turning this way and that, battered by the franticly dancing particles in the air.

Her eyes greedily soaked in the sights of the city and the glittering stars high above the smog.

The warmth of the living radiated through ruddy flesh. If only she could reach out and touch…but her hands were firmly tucked beneath her arm pits, clamping, keeping them there. She still remembered what it was like to be human.

She walked on bare feet for miles, until her skin underfoot should have been broken and bleeding. She had nowhere to go and yet she was compelled to keep moving. Her thoughts reaching out to him as the sun sunk low into the earth and the moon lit high above.

In the darkness the crow descended, perching on the bonnet of a nearby car. She stopped to stare, light bouncing across sable wings, head cocked, eyes regarding her with keen intelligence. Eyes, eyes, eyes. The colour of sugilite.

She reached out a hand but the image of the crow shivered and disappeared altogether.

She broke out into a run as if she could chase the inky black shadow to the source. To him.

Her hand closed round a handle. Bells. She spun in circles at the sound. Bells, like divine heralds. Trapped inside four walls. She was floating between pungent aisles with no recollection of how she had got there.

"Can I help you?" The irritated clerk got off his little stool and stared.

She was stopped over a shelf, staring through a stained purple jar, watching the light refract. Fascinated.

The boy cleared his throat. "I said, can I help you?"

Her eyes flicked to his, teeth irresistibly slipping their sheath to graze her bottom lip.

"Who is it, Tobias?" And old woman's voice hovered from behind him.

Alex's eyes lifted to see the silhouette behind the beaded curtain that separated the store from the living quarters. The old woman, Edgith Harman, spine crooked and leaning heavily on two canes stared steadily back.

Something landed on the bonnet of a nearby car. They all turned to look through the dusty pane of the magic shop window.

The caw of the crow set Alex to trembling and she turned, panicked, knocking a jar to the ground and the glass shattered about their ankles, spilling pungent spice to the ground, clay clouds wafting around them.

Tobias helped her up. Muttering under his breath.

"Bring her." Edgith said.

*

Alex was sat slumped on a stool in a small kitchen, washing up still festering in the sink.

Close up, The Crone was a wrinkled old woman with bent carriage and quick green eyes. She came toward Alex slowly, balancing on her two canes but Alex suspected she could move quickly if she wished.

Alex knew the Power the old witch held with just a glance, the air seemed to vibrate with energy like shivering lines of heat.

The apprentice, Tobias retreated back to the shop with one last lingering look leaving the two women alone.

Recognition, that strange sense of de-ja-vu. Alex blinked and saw in a momentary flash a beautiful maiden with long blond hair and the same green eyes. Edgith Harman. She saw the same flash of detection in the old woman's eyes. _Don't I know you?_

"I was…I am Alex Burrows." She whispered.

The old woman gripped her wrist, her hold was bruising, she remained on her feet as she sized the vampire up.

Edgith's glittering bangle caught her eye, the small stones glinting fierce in the rays of light that seeped through the blinds.

"Ms Burrows. Alex." Her head snapped up to soak in the sight of the aged face. The sparkling knowledge in those all too familiar green eyes.

She sussed Alex out in a second: a new vampire who was easily distracted, led by hungers and not reason. She had not been taught, her sanity slowly fraying from the potency of the blood that had transformed her, that was still inside her.

She touched Alex's chin and the vampire's head jerked back. "The Night World, Alex."

Alex eyes were back on her face.

"It is a society based on stringent laws. Somebody broke the rules to bring you here and that can not be ignored."

Alex shrugged. There was no dispute. She was alone and could not outrun what was all around her. Every shadow was a threat, the Night, Draconi, Pope, all the mysteries of the world were out to annihilate her.

She closed her eyes and shuddered at the thought of Pope and his eyes that danced like living flame.

Another touch, feather light and cool wrinkled flesh lingering on her brow. Alex's eyes opened, she was receptive, mesmerised by the Crone's soft voice.

"Doors have been opened now." The Crone said softly. "Powers will come, memories, gifts from past lives. Do you understand?"

Alex covered her face with her hands feeling tears slipping past her fingertips.

"You are dangerous because of this."

Alex nodded in agreement.

There was silence as the Crone stood in a thoughtful pose. Powers were rising across the Night. Cosmic alignment of actions and incidents that would lead them all to one point. The end of this world and the birth of the new world.

The vampire girl sitting desolate and filled with grief, whose aura burned as fierce as open flame and oily black darkness was no coincidence. _I know you_, Edgith thought as she stroked the girl's hair from her face exposing her tears.

"You will be taken to Thierry Descourdres." She decided.


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter Two:

The mansion was a sprawling society of both the youthful and beautiful and others old and wretched. The denizens of the Day threaded their way about the palatial columns and marble floors. It reminded Alex of a temple: these people to acolytes of some great and lofty god.

She felt the squeeze of the wards as she shuffled through the door, Edgith Harman's hand firmly on her wrist. A delegation of somebodies had come to greet them, kneeling and scraping before the Hearth Woman.

Alex would not disobey the Crone, she trusted her implicitly and so bit her tongue.

She was marched through a complicated maze, feeling the heat of bodies beyond each door and through each corridor. The sticky sweet scent of magic, clung to her senses making her footing uncertain. "Focus." The old witch murmured and Alex put her chin to her chest and concentrated on Edgith's wheezing breath.

"De Vries is here." Someone muttered to the Crone.

Edgith made a _humph_ sound under her breath. "What's that good for nothing doing here?" De Vries was visiting from the Northern territories, he was a Night Lord as well as a one time protégé of Descourdres and ally of the Day. Alex could feel the history biting in the old woman's voice.

"Wait here." Edgith said pushing her toward a small leather sofa. She sunk down into the seat and watched as she disappeared inside the tastefully decorated lobby.

Alex lifted her eyes to the swarm of guards, not only vampires but skin walkers and spell casters all united on one ground. She marvelled at it. Surely this was what Tasi had spoken of, the fabled Circle of harmony.

As if harmony could be kept between fractious tribes, her thoughts drifted to Maya, to the Sarima…Even that one irresistible thought brought a wave of emotion and images thick and fast, exploding behind her eyelids and it was all of _him_. The whole world receded to become the thick, oily dark vines that pulsed from of the middle of her chest. The chord that bound her to her maker, her lover, her_ soul mate._

Time passed but it was all a millisecond to her, reality was secondary to the tumult inside her mind. The garbled, strangled sound of her once fluid voices slowly dying inside her as she became more vampire.

"Alex." Edgith's slapped her smartly about the face and Alex blinked up at her. "Focus yourself child. You can go inside now."

*

Alex sat beneath the intense stare of Thierry Descourdres, there was an awful kind of darkness to his eyes that was all to do with sorrow. She could feel herself sliding into the depths of benevolence and patience and drench in his fathomless compassion but….but…

"Alexandra Burrows." Gage De Vries stretched her name on his tongue as if it were something to taste and he found the taste of it unpleasant.

_Maya made you._ She thought, eyes on Thierry and she could feel pin prick of anger amidst the wealth of age old grief. Angry as she had been angry. The imprint of the Queen of thieves neatly marred his psyche.

Thierry's eyes widened a fraction, a brief and mere hint that he had heard her. She dropped her head to her chest, her mind had become muddled and exhausted, blocking him out.

"And what are we supposed to believe?" Gage asked, his dark brow arching. "That you were an immaculate conception?"

"It's hard to remember." She said and it was so true. She could feel it in her bones, the memories that sat and simmered there but she could never quite recall, memories like her father's face.

Thierry remained silent though his intense eyes were fixed to her bowed head, though she could feel his mental hands trying to slither through her armour and expose some scrap of information or emotion.

"Who will vouch for you?" Gage pressed.

"My maker is…gone." She revealed softly. _Gone, gone, gone._

"Dead?"

"No." She gave a faint shake of the head.

"Oh." Gage looked intensely at Thierry and back to Alex._ Abandoned _was the word on the tip of Gage's tongue and he was waiting to wield it, to lash out at her like a whip. Needless to say he didn't trust her.

"I will vouch for her." Edgith spoke up, glaring at Gage from where she had been sitting quietly.

"I have nowhere else to go." Alex added.

"No family?" Thierry asked, his voice soft, deceptively young.

She had the shaky memories of foetal mass on her fingertips, fingertips sliding passed her lips as she sucked them dry. She shook her head again, raising eyes to his alone. "No."

"Who made you?"

Her eyes slipped away from them both. "I don't know." She lied.

All the forces of the world had driven her to this point to be remade and re-fashioned to this body. Who had made her? Her father? Pope? Nergal? Draconi? Or was it the fire hot rage deep inside her, the vitriolic voice that slithered demon tongue into her brain, the Bride whose name echoed deep inside: _Agrat-bat-mahlaht_.

"If you're not willing to co-operate-"

"Gage." Edgtih said mildly and the deceptively young man stepped aside looking solemn.

"I can't answer your questions, I don't know the answers but I know I need help." She looked into Thierry Descourdres eyes and met there in the stream of sympathy an understanding. They communicated silently, telling tales of souls being torn asunder.

Gage cleared his throat and Alex's head snapped toward him.

"Ms Burrows, please can you give us a moment alone." Thierry's calm even tone sliced through the tension.

Edgith gave a small reassuring nod and moments later Alex was sat outside, her head lay on the arm of the sofa, cool leather soothing her cheek. She could hear the three speaking beyond the door and could imagine the gestures as The Crone, Descourdres and De Vries debated the mystery of her presence.

"...I trust the Crone." Thierry was saying in his soft persistent tone.

Edgith nodded silently looking at Thierry alone.

"The Council will ask for her head." Gage warned them mildly.

"They would demand satisfaction from any new born not sanctioned by The Five." Thierry said, voice becoming hard, almost angry. "You of all people should know this, Gage."

Gage sighed wearily. "We should hear their demands, my Lord. You don't know who made her and for what purpose and maybe they do."

"It was not of her choosing."

"Regardless." Gage shook his head. "She's a liability."

"This is no concern of yours." Edgith thrust her cane to the ground. "I have come here on behalf of that poor child to seek clemency from Lord Descourdres. This is not a matter for _you_."

Gage turned an intense faze on the old woman. "You don't even know who she is, Edie."

"Do not call me that." The old woman ground out fiercely.

Thierry's chin was perched on his fist and he appeared deep in thought. "Not all of us get a choice." He murmured silencing the two.

Alex closed her eyes and was confronted with images printed on the back of her lids. The vision of dark tunnels and blood and Draconi. Always Draconi. Tunnels and fire and beings made of flame. _The enemy of my enemy is my friend. _She thought and fell into an uneasy sleep.


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter Three:

Weeks had passed since Alex had first sat before Thierry Descourdres, since she had first sat in the kitchenette of the pokey little magic shop on the back streets of nowhere. Now she sat at a table, the Crone of all witches seated, her crooked carriage poised over her dining table casually flicking through a magazine to give Alex the illusion of privacy.

They had been talking for hours. Edgith could not shake the nagging feeling of knowing the vampire girl through and through and asked questions that seemed to lead nowhere. "Do you remember your mother, child?"

Alex's eyes were closed, _remember your mother_, she could remember the warmth of her mother's womb, the lulling sound of her voice through her flesh. Basking in the radiance of life. And then screams, the tearing and bending as the baby rushed through the tunnel to take its first breaths.

Smoke stuffed into her mouth, clogging her underdeveloped lungs, scorching her delicate skin. _"My baby." _Her mother had gurgled before blood slipped from her mouth and her eyes rolled into the back of her skull to greet the darkness of death.

"No." She said aloud. "She died when I was born."

"I'm sorry." The witch said and reached out across the table patting her hand. Alex marvelled at the soft warmth of her wrinkled flesh and on contact could pick up the rhythm of her heart, a calm steady beating.

"And your father?"

Thrust into another memory, she found herself remembering things she forgotten but it was all returning with acute clarity. She remembered her father pacing the floor of his study, a myriad of books releasing tastes and textures and smells were open on the desk, on the floor.

Pages were open offering pieces to a puzzle he was imminently going to piece together. "_…untold mysteries of an otherworld right in front of our very noses. Boggles that have haunted cultures since ancient times of creatures who claimed the earth Ages before man. So much time unaccounted for …"_

Yes, Alexander Burrows had a vast appetite for the vast mysteries of the Ages, the unknown histories of other races. "_Older than mankind, just think, my love."_ He would ruffle her hair and pet her soft round cheeks.

She remembered a man romancing the notion of the unearthly, and he was a man on the sublime tip of revelation, obsessed by it. And then Alex remembered the smoke and beneath the veils of smoke Alexander Burrows broken and bleeding form they had tried so hard to hide from her.

"My father is dead." She had had many fathers in this one lifetime. Pope, the guilty secret beating in her heart and on her tongue as she refused to reveal him to the Day. It would only cause more harm. And then there was Draconi…

"Is there a cure for vampirism?" Alex asked shyly.

The Crone's withered face cracked into a smile and then a laugh erupted. "Oh no. Vampirism has an awful kind of permanency to it. I'm sorry, my dear, you are fated to remain forever-"

"Like this."

"You're a pretty enough girl." She patted the vampire's shoulder awkwardly. Alex shivered to think of her unchanging flesh, her life doomed to the one body for all eternity.

She stared at her distorted reflection in the surface of tea from a cup the Crone had made by Alex had not the heart to drink. She was not pretty. Not anything really. Illuminated by the magic that lit her dead heart, it was an illusion, the legacy of the Queen of Thieves making the world believe she was more compelling than she was. She closed her eyes again.

All the joy that life had to offer, family, friends, children and the peace of death were lost to her now. She was no longer human, not part of the natural order, she was doomed to live half in the life of darkness where Pope's true face lurked with gnashing teeth and his demons stood in readiness behind him.

She must never forget that Pope was still out there.

And after all of that there was the being inside her. The knot of flame that was her first true being and it was a battle not to give rise to the voice, and the will of _Agrat-bat-mahlaht_.

"You have your meeting with Descourdres tonight?" Alex nodded, yes. "He's a good leader, he takes care of his people."

But Alex was not of his people, not truly.

"I must go, I have my own meeting to attend." Edgith took her time to stand and Alex didn't offer to help.

The Crone had been meeting with her every other week and though she never pressed Alex for answers as the Day did. Alex could simply speak in confidence because beneath it all she had her own nagging feeling that she had met this woman before in another place and time.

One day soon she would tell the Crone all that she knew. Maybe. Someday. Soon.

Alex left the tatty little store and walked back alone toward the housing facility the Day had provided to keep her safe, neatly locked away from trouble. As if it could be that easy.

The grateful denizens of the little complex scuttled round discreetly trying to salvage what lives they could after the revelation of the Night. Alex kept to herself, watching them, listening to them, falling in love with them little by little.

She reached there in no time of all, though Alex walked in a daze, her eyes sliding this way and that seeking out shadows of her old life.

She saw a petit little brunette staring at her, there was no menace or posturing just the stare of a curious young woman. A large scar ran from the right side of her mouth to her ear, pink and swollen and grotesque. When she found Alex staring back at her she turned her face away in shame and disappeared into a dark doorway.

Alex often saw the girl with large volumes tucked under her arm, she would bring books into her home a new one almost everyday.

Alex continued up the five flights of stairs to her little domicile. When she opened the door to the one bedroom apartment - which was empty of any real possessions: a mattress on a sinking wooden frame in one corner and a table with one damp wooden stool in the other - she knew she wasn't alone.

"Welcome back." She found Gage De Vries leant on the edge of the window where he had been watching her progress into the building. "Been anywhere interesting?"

Alex closed the door behind her.

"It's nice to see you again too." Gage muttered running a hand through his scruffy brown hair.

"What do you want?" She asked evenly.

His eyes narrowed, angry. "I've come to give you your schedule: a course of therapy and some routine testing, we ask this of all our strays."

"It was my understanding you had no jurisdiction in Las Vegas."

"As far as you're concerned, honey, I am the authority everywhere you go."

Her head tilted. _Is that right? _She asked and could feel the laughter bubble up inside her chest but she didn't let it rise past her lips. Gage had the ear of the Lord of the Day and she was far safer here than on her own.

"I don't want you going round to the Harman place anymore, do you understand?" He said and she could feel the underlying hint of violence in his voice.

She said nothing.

"I've left your timetable on the desk." He said and rose to leave.

She gave him a wide berth in the hopes he would go quietly. An instant before his foot was to pass the threshold he moved with alarming speed, taking hold of her shoulders and pinning her against the nearest wall. "I don't scare you do I?" His mouth intimately close to hers, fangs sliding to touch his lower lip.

_There are worse things than the Night World._ Alex voice was haunting as it materialised in his mind and for a moment he thought he would fall into the seams of her consciousness, her green eyes losing colour, turning pale so pale and then blue, the colour of flame.

He released her trying to disguise his loss of control and sudden confusion with a smirk. "I'll be keeping my eye on you, Miss Burrows."

And she expected no less.

*

Everything was precisely organised in the Descourdres mansion to ensure that everyone was where they needed to be and those who weren't were identified and dealt with quickly. Beneath the veneer of unity it was a smoothly run military operation.

She had to admire the well oiled machine of the Day. _You haven't seen its defences yet, child. _Hissed through her mind, Alex had long become acquainted with this voice, the prickly voice of the Bride.

She was held back with a heavy hand on her shoulder.

Everyone had come to a stop in the aisles to allow a petite blond girl to walk down the centre, there was nothing remarkable about her save for the port wine stain on her cheek. Her eyes were shyly set on the ground.

"My Lady." The vampire beside Alex gave a deep bow.

Alex stared at the girl, confused, having no idea who she as. _It's Mistress Snow, she's an Old Soul, Lord Thierry's soul mate, the most revered member of this household._ Her escort's mental voice was gruff and grating through her mind.

Alex stared unabashed into the benevolent eyes of the so called Old Soul. For an instant she found herself transported as if she were looking into her own eyes, whispers flooded her ears, their words making her tongue thick and mouth fill with saliva. The voices that had been so well behaved returned with a resounding hiss sharper and deadlier than the Bride alone.

_Pay your respects._

Alex stood in front of the girl, Hannah Snow and she stared back as if she too were completely absorbed in a vision. Without hesitation Hannah embraced her, a long tight embrace of one who understood. The contact lulled Alex's whispers into a soothing chorus until soon they disappeared altogether, gone as quickly as they had risen.

Alex soon found herself clinging to the girl, fingers twisting the fabric of her shirt, face buried against her hair, the soft warm skin of her human throat. She held her as if she were the only solid thing in the room. "It's okay." Hannah Snow cooed.

But it wasn't okay. Alex breathed the scent of the girl, the wild, untamed, unseen life that her soul had lived.

"Hana." She whispered.

The girl stiffened.

Alex spoke in a language that only Hana understood, it was beyond Alex's conscious mind, the words she spoke but Hannah understood and began to cry.

Her escort vampire pushed Alex roughly to one side, clearing the isle so Hannah could continue her progress through the halls. The near-overwhelming rush of what had happened blossomed in her head like a well struck needle to the brain. She was momentarily weak and had to grip her companion to stay on her feet.

"Do you know her?" Her escort asked, his voice as rough as the one that had sounded in her mind.

Alex shook her head, no.

Alex wax careful to remain expressionless for the rest of the journey as she was taken through to the South apartments where the mansion had been re-fashioned into a network of intimate interview rooms and holding cells.

She was seated in one such interview room, waiting for the arrival of Lord Descourdres himself.

He came in gracefully and nodded to his people at the door to close it behind him. They were alone, his presence seemed to fill the room with palpable energy.

"How have you been?" He asked aloud to be polite.

"Well." She replied blandly, eyes on the desk in front of her rather than his face.

"And your sessions with Dr. Morgan?" He prompted.

Dr Celeste Morgan specialised in memory therapy, Alex had been assigned as her patient to begin with to see if they could recover any of Alex's memories. "Fine."

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence. Thierry seemed to lean forward from his seat, casting a shadow over her body. "Concerns have been raised-"

"By DeVries?" She looked up, instantly angry.

He tilted his head, pondering the speed of her emotion, the animal alertness that possessed her. "Yes. Gage has his reservations about taking you in."

"And you?"

He took a moment to consider his reply. His eyes were intense on her face and she failed to meet his eyes again for fear he would be able to read the secrets she had been keeping from them all. "You intrigue me, Miss Burrows."

"Alex." She corrected distantly.

"Alex." He put a manila file down in front of her.

"My profile?" She enquired as he opened it up before her and she saw a handful of glossy photo prints and a few sheets of indecipherable writing.

"I have here evidence of your involvement with Von Seggern and Malavazos, the vampire partnership in San Francisco." He showed her a fuzzy print of her standing in the lobby of the offices in Mission Street. "Can you explain this?"

"I…I don't remember." She lied, frowning.

"Don't play games with me, Alex. Don't give me a reason to believe Gage." He said and reached for her hand that she quickly snatched away avoiding contact altogether.

Another moment of uncomfortable silenced stretched between them. A charged kind of energy rising and swirling in the cramped little room, jarring against Alex, provoking the hisses of her inner voices and in particular the Bride.

"Alright." She said and traced her photographed face with a fingertip. "I knew Tasi Malavazos."

His chin resting on his fist, his eyes narrowed on her face, watching carefully for lies.

"I used to pay her protection money."

A sceptical eyebrow rose. "So you knew about the Night before you were Turned?"

She bit her lip and shrugged. There was no neat way to explain things, only the truth could do it but everything inside her was keeping her tongue hostage. An innate knowledge that she should not and maybe never tell the truth.

"If we're going to help you, we need to know the truth." He said as if reading her mind.

"I know-" She said and faltered but she was saved by a soft knock on the door and dark head peered inside beckoning Thierry out of the room.

_Are you sure this is what you want to do? _The Bride asked. _Reveal yourself to the boy? _Thierry was older than Alex could conceive, older even than Draconi but then Agrat was older still. She put her head in her hands."Do I have a choice?"

_You always have a choice. _The Bride snarled.

"Not when you're a nobody like me." This quieted the voice. The Bride didn't like to be reminded of her being one and the same flesh as Alex, the nobody. No one cared whether she lived or died, although the Bride did.

Thierry came back in the room a few moments later, he looked uneasy and didn't resume his seat. His hands curled tightly around the back of his chair. "I regret that I'll have to re-schedule the meeting for some other time. I hope you can stay with us here for a little while so we can have the chance to speak."

She nodded, yes.

_You will regret trusting him. _The Bride warned.

She regretted far too much already.


	5. Chapter 4

Chapter Four:

Alex stayed at the mansion where a bunk was provided in a modest room and her movement was constricted to four halls that lead in turn to a kitchen, a courtyard, a hydroponics garden and an assembly hall. She had an ample stack of books from Livy to Stephen King, and all that fell between the two.

She moved like a phantom through the sprawling life of the Day, other residents carefully avoided her, if they happened upon her path their eyes would stray to the walls or the windows as if she didn't exist.

She spoke only in therapy, her sessions with Dr. Morgan on day release to the Dayspring Clinic in Paradise Valley at midday at least three times a week. The sessions lasted approximately one hour and little was said though Dr. Morgan tried hard to tease the truth from her unwilling tongue.

She had even commended Alex on her progress though Alex felt no difference bar the ever strengthening voice of the Bride slithering through the deep tissues of her brain.

One midday she sat in the lobby of the Dayspring clinic, reading a dog eared copy of Ovid's Metamorphoses, her mind focused on Calydon singing songs of fair Deianira when her eyes flicked up briefly, a sweet taste infiltrated her mouth and caught sight of the dark haired girl with the pinky pale half grin scar running from the right side of her mouth to her ear.

She had seen the girl several times, at the apartments, in the mansion, staring at her from doorways and distances. When Alex had caught her eye she turned her back, her shoulders hunched. A whisper breezed through her skull.

"Who is she?" She asked aloud.

The girl beside her looked up from her own magazine, eyes flicking up sighting the scarred girl and then looking away with a careless shrug. "It's only Butterfly."

Butterfly.

Alex was already on her feet walking steadily toward the girl whose head slowly turned to meet her eyes and Alex watched her heart shaped mouth part and tremble.

"I'm Alex." She offered a hand and the girl stared at if as if it were a dangerous thing. "You're Butterfly, right?" Alex tried hard to inject all sincerity into her words, using the magnetic push and pull of vampire magic to lull the girl into a space of trust.

"Yes." The girl said, her voice soft and velvety. "Butterfly Rocha."

"You've been watching me." Alex said. "Back at the mansion, and here, why?"

Butterfly looked either side of her as if seeking an escape rout from Alex and her question and Alex could hear the human heart beat racing and it provoked her hunger, though this she was learning to control it, teeth behind her lips.

Butterfly offered an eloquent shrug.

It seemed the girl was intent on not speaking, and the moments passed uneasily between the two. With a sigh, warm with the undercurrents of anger and irritation, Alex turned to head back to her seat and her book.

"I have dreams-" Butterfly Rocha's voice came out in a rush which caused Alex to spin round. "I had a dream about you. But we can't…shouldn't talk here."

Alex was intrigued and cast a look either side of her but there was only the girl on the couch and she was paying no attention to either of them. "Let's get out of here." She suggested and took a step toward the door.

Butterfly Rocha looked thoroughly shocked by the notion but Alex was already walking out of the twin glass doors, making the girl have to jog to catch up to her.

Butterfly Rocha rhythmically smacked the spoon against the side of the porcelain cup as she stirred her now lukewarm cup of chair, her sad and intense eyes were set on the window, as if waiting for someone to discover them the two of them. Alex had the same sense of foreboding her eyes set on the cyclone the girl had created in her tea cup.

"Tell me about your dreams." Alex prompted softly.

Rocha flinched and her eyes returned to Alex's face. "Dreams?"

Alex shifted in her seat, eyeing the patrons who paid them no attention. "You said you dreamt about me."

"I did." She whispered. "It's silly."

Alex spread her hands on the arm rests of the faux leather queen Anne seat and dug her nails into the fabric until it creaked beneath the pressure.

"No one listens to me."

"Rocha." Alex said. "Butterfly."

"I dreamt of chains and dark corridors, smoke and black rock and flames. The world was burning and you stood in the middle of it…" She hesitated her bottom lip began to tremble and she looked close to tears.

Alex licked her lips and leant forward in her chair. "What else?"

"I…I…" She stammered.

Alex lunged forward and grasped the girl's face with both hands and channelled her mental energy like a spear, splitting apart the girl's psyche to reveal the heart of the dream. Sulphur instantly filled her nostrils and throat, a great heat stripped the flesh from her bones and she saw the bright, brilliant orange of flames and in the flames dragons hovered and a silhouette danced. The mighty voice of the Bride of Hell laughed and she opened her hot and sinful mouth to say…

Alex released the girl who was left rocking slightly in her chair. The noise of the café seemed to violate her senses and the dream world that had been so real suddenly deserted her and she was gasping for breath she didn't need to take.

"You shouldn't have done that." Butterfly said softly.

They sat in silence staring at one another.

"Are you a witch?" Alex asked, her voice rasped between her lips.

"Half or less." Butterfly looked down at the her lap, couldn't bare to look at the vampire. "I see things…sometimes."

"Why were you dreaming about me? What does it mean?" She wondered aloud though expected no answers from Butterfly Rocha who was flushed and looking thoroughly embarrassed.

"I don't know." She said softly as if afraid she would hear her own voice. "I don't understand these things."

"How long have you had this dream?" She demanded and was cautioned to lower her voice as the customers surrounding them turned their heads and whispered behind their hands and into their coffee cups.

"Years."

"Years?" A brow rose, she found it hard to believe.

"Since I was a child, before…"

"Before what?" Alex probed staring at the mass of scar tissue at her mouth, curious about how it happened..

"Before I found out what I was."

She studied the girl's face, looking past the scar, to the soft brown cheeks and dark eyes and she could have been pretty if it weren't for the sadness she wore like a shroud. She wanted to ask many more questions, about the scar, about her life but thought it would probably only scare her off.

"We should get back before they realise we're missing." Rocha said.

"Why so anxious?" She asked.

Wide, haunted eyes. "There are things out there, you know?"

Alex looked out over to the street, the bland expressions of passers by and a large crow perched on the tip of a street lamp. It ruffled its sable feathers and cocked its head as if aware of her sitting in the café. A chill ran through to her very bones. "Let's go."

She led the girl back to the Clinic, using her senses to get back there. They walked side by side in silence, the vision of the Bride that had haunted Rocha for years now burned inside Alex like a smouldering seed.

She opened the door for Rocha and allowed her to enter first, she cast a superstitious glance on the path they had just come. The instant she stepped back into the lobby, it was swarming with people.

All heads turned when Alex and Butterfly entered the foyer.

"Where the hell have you been?" Gage DeVries hissed.

"We went for a coffee." Alex said, pushing Rocha protectively behind her.

"You don't drink…coffee." He reminded her coldly and then looking to Rocha. "Are you okay, love?"

"I wasn't aware I was under arrest." Alex said, not giving Rocha the space to answer him and she gripped Alex's wrist tight as if to warn her to back down and soften her tone.

"Lord Descourdres wants to see you." Gage hissed.

"And you thought you'd make the journey down here to tell me?"

"That's enough." Neither vampire had seen Dr Morgan stride into the lobby with an expression as fierce as Alex felt. "Are the two of you quite finished? You're terrifying my patients."

Alex looked away, allowing Rocha to grasp her hand, borrowing some of her calm.

"I suggest the two of you leave, and Ms Burrows you can re-schedule your appointment with reception."

"Let's go." Gage hissed as he passed her. Alex evaded his reaching hand and Rocha's grasp became painfully tight.

"It's okay, Rocha." She murmured and the girl released her. "I'll be alright."

She followed DeVries to his sleek silver car, two dark suited vampire sat in the front, Alex and DeVries in the back aware of the other two People on motorcycles either side. "Why all of this?" She asked softly breaking the tense silence.

"I thought I made it clear, I don't trust you." He replied evenly without sparing her a glance. "We know more about you than you think, Alexandra Burrows and it's only a matter of time before we find out the truth."

"Truth?" She laughed under her breath. "You want to drag my name down to the dirt never mind the truth."

He was silent for the rest of the journey.

"You want the truth?" Alex asked.

"That's all we've ever asked of you." Thierry Descourdres said evenly fingertips tapping on the manila file set in front of him.

Her mouth subtly filled with the taste of sulphur, the taste of the Bride and Rocha's vivid dreams. She lay her chin upon her fist and blinked up at Thierry's pretty features. "What's it like?" She asked. "Facing immortality?"

"You will learn to bear it." He replied his tone softening, sympathising. "You will learn to bear a lot."

"You were brought over by Maya." She said suddenly.

His expression bland, it was common knowledge among the Night World that Maya had first bitten Thierry. Though it was not knowledge known to the newly turned. His eyebrow rose.

"There's a certain monotony about her chosen." She explained.

"And what would you know about it?"

A small humourless smile curved her lips. "Because I knew her."

He gave a look that would wither a lesser soul but Alex was infused with the strength of a score of souls, the pride, the pain, the suffering and glared back at him.

"How?"

"Because I was born before." _Do you even understand what you are saying? _The Bride shrieked and her vision blurred momentarily. "Do you understand?"

"That's a bold claim."

"It's not a claim." She said wearily. "It's the truth."

"And what makes you think that you had a previous life?" He asked evenly, flicking through the pages in front of him, doubt touching his fine features because Dr. Morgan had not included this in her reports.

There was a knock at the door and DeVries entered without waiting for a response from inside.

Alex put a hand to her head as the old and terrible ache settled in her skull at the fever of the Bride's rage. "When I was a child I used to hear voices-" _Don't you dare_. "I was convinced it was a medical condition, I used pills to shut them up but they were more than that. It was a vampire who showed me how much more."

"Is that why you paid Malavazos?"

Gage looking between the two, eager to hear what she had to say for herself.

"I paid Tasi because I didn't want to die." Tears now because God knew how true that was, she hadn't wanted to die, she just wanted to survive into her twenties.

"And this vampire he Turned you against your will?"

"Yes." Though he had done it to save her from something worse, or so he had thought.

Silence. There were so many questions but Thierry knew he had to choose them carefully.

"There's just one problem with your story." Gage said.

Alex turned to him, her eyes glowing, turning from forest shades of green to a dark dirty swamp. "What?"

"Alex Burrows doesn't exist."

Silence.

"Or at least she died in October 1994, her death is recorded by the London Borough of Islington. They even buried a body, it's sitting in the Islington and St. Pancras Cemetery."

Thierry turned to Alex. "It's complicated."

"Well we've got all the time in the world for you to explain." Gage said and took a seat beside Thierry.


	6. Chapter 5

_First Draft_

**Chapter Five:**

In the time that passed, the Day used psychologists, sorcerers and psychics to try get to the root of Alexandra Burrows but they could not find a thing at all.

No one approached her to speak. She was isolated in her gilded prison, though she could hear the beating of their footsteps, the rumble of conversations vibrating through the walls and this isolation struck a chord deep inside the echo of her former selves.

In these times she dreamt as Rocha had shown her, black rock, she dreamt of twisted scaly bodies nestling in the deep dark warmth of the planet's core, she dreamt of flame and the Bride dancing on a giant pyre that was the ruins of the world. Sometimes she even woke with charred black skin that healed quick and clean.

She wanted to speak to the dreamer again, Butterfly Rocha who saw the Bride clear in her dreams.

Time tumbled haplessly onward until it had at last come to the Longest Night, and even Alex was invited to celebrate the Night all Others celebrated.

Standing in a borrowed dress of off white chiffon, her feet bare but wreathed in chains of flowers. She was not immune to the call of deep magic that hummed in the very threads of the air.

The great hall was overcrowded, a great number of People clothed in glittering costumes mimicking long dead and forgotten gods.

How strange it seemed to her now, to suddenly be on the inside of the mysteries of the Night. How her father would turn green with envy.

"Drink?" The dulcet voice escaped its white glittering mask and Alex shook her head, no and with a shrug the white clothed witch turned away with her tray of champagne.

"Oh but you must _drink_." A voice slithered in her hear. She turned but no one was there. She shook her head, perhaps it was the voices playing tricks on her. Her eyes raised across the ribbon of gathered People and saw the stark black achingly familiar silhouette.

The curtains of the great stage were parted with a flourish and seven figures stood in a line.

Alex knew of each and every one.

The Crone of all Witches and her apprentice Tobias constant lending her an arm. Lord Thierry Descourdres and on his arm Lady Hannah Snow. To their left the Lord and Lady of the First House of shape shifters, honorary guests but as of yet not sworn allies.

Thierry was courting them, Alex could hear them through the walls as they negotiated a tenuous peace for an uncertain future.

"Maya is dead." Thierry declared in an solemn monotone.

Alex could feel the Sarima claw up from the din of her former selves and delight in the news. Warmth radiated beneath her skin and she held onto herself. Maya was dead and a new queen stood at the vampire prince's side, a diminutive human girl with a port wine stain high on her cheekbone.

More was said but Alex didn't lend her ears to it. Her eyes was back on the crowd, looking for the shadowy figure.

Soon the gathering on the stage disbanding. The People converged on the dance floor and sweet music rose to obscure the buzz of their voices.

Gage De Vries' followed her progress through the outer rim of the dancers, his keen eye rarely straying from her in the course of the night. Often mouthing the words. _I'm watching you, _as if she didn't already know he was.

"Have you seen Butterfly?" She asked a group of masked kids. They shook their heads in unison, though their true expressions were hidden behind their masks. "Have you seen Butterfly Rocha?" More blank stares and shoulder shrugging.

She moved deeper into the thickness of the undulating revel, indulging her senses in the scents and heat of them, the magic and Power of the Longest Night. The magic told her to throw her arms up above her head.

"Excuse me." She murmured as she brushed past one man.

He turned and her body broke out in goosebumps. She knew, even before their eyes met, lavender, violet, heliotropes… Breathing hard. Mock breaths. Frightened, exhilarated. The soul link depleted her senses.

Her lips parted in a sigh.

His arms were around her, his grip solid and enduring.

She felt as if she could release all her weight, all her worries in his arms. "Draconi." The name released between her lips. The echo of many voices overlapped. The chorus of her beings instantly recognising him and the syllables of his name.

"Alexandra." Her name spoken in a possessive growl making her shiver.

A thousand phantoms of the intimate moments they had shared closed in on her all in an instant. They swayed but she was barely conscious of dancing, her feet never feeling the solid ground beneath.

He danced her into the shadows, to an isolated place where she was completely at his mercy. All to aware of her vulnerability all sense of relief and fluidity left her rigid.

"The enemy of my enemy." She murmured drowsily.

He laughed and it made her shudder. "You think we're enemies?"

His mouth was so close she could feel him leeching Power from the very air. Vacuum of his Power and of his age. She reached out and touched him, bare fingers connecting with his smooth marble hard cheek.

She was inside his mind, inside his skin, watching through his eyes again. Being both Alex and Draconi she felt, she watched…

…_he watched from between two trees as Ea was seized. The grip on his spear became painful, the wood bending beneath his grasp and he winced, the smallest cry ripped from his lips as a splinter slithered into his palm. His gaze became watery, his palm began to itch and then to burn…_

…_Sitting in darkness , beside a river that had now become ash. There were bodies and parts of bodies scattered and stinking around him. The necklace of tooth and bone in his hands, Ea's necklace. His insides in turmoil with the dishonour of it all, blood red demon tears stained his cheeks._

_Maya wound a pale hand around his throat and whispered in his ear, tongue flicking his lobe. "What peace could have ever been bought between the two of you?"_

…_Draconi turned his back on a field littered with bodies both dead and dying an agonising death. The earth was scorched by flame that was red, blue and green flame. "You will not turn your back on me." Maya screamed. But it was done and their company parted for an age…._

"_I would be foolish to tangle with another demon." Draconi spoke, _Alex felt her mouth move_._

"_I want Nergal and Nergal wants her and I need you to get to them both." Pope smiled holding a dagger made of bone…._

…_.Black smoke and bodies, Draconi thrust open the thick oak door to an intimate study. Spinning in circles to take in the cut outs pinned to the walls, articles and chapters on the world of Others and a maps with pins to exotic places. There was books. Many books. And Alexander Burrows wide green eyes as he sunk his teeth into the hollow of his throat…_

Alex prized herself away from him, falling to the ground in a tangle of dress and tears. "Bastard."

"I didn't invite you to invade my memories." He hissed looking as distraught as she felt.

She could not find words to express the emotions that took hold of her, she could not even muster the strength to stand.

"I was wondering where you went." Blaise Harman's voice rose to interrupt them, she spoke with such familiarity it made Alex flinch.

The twinge of jealousy ignited the voices in her mind, voices that she had been hearing less and less the further away she stayed from Draconi.

"Oh it's you." Blaise spared a brief glance at Alex.

Draconi's hand closed around Blaise's upper arm, he leaned in close. "Run along now little witch, the grown ups are talking."

Blaise's mouth opened unflatteringly, she could not assemble quick enough to retort and Draconi took Alex by the arm and led her away. "Let go of me." She hissed and she was spun into the crowd and when she turned Draconi was gone. Immediate panic set in. She looked around desperately to no avail, she sprinted to the exit, into the crisp cool night air but still she couldn't find him.

Instead she saw Rocha's head turn violently to one side. "You don't belong here, if you're not going to put out then what use are you around here? Stupid little whore-"

The boy's face was twisted with animal rage, his figure slender but tall casting a shadow of Rocha.

Instinct kicked in and Alex was beside Rocha in an instant, her hand closed around the boy's, enough to stop his breath but not to damage. Rocha's hand closed around Alex's arm as if to tell her to stop. "You do not lay a hand on her, do you understand?" Alex said her eyes flame bright.

The boy nodded, his cheeks losing colour and with a further squeeze from Rocha she relinquished her grip and the boy collapsed to his knees, breathing hard. He looked up at Alex, the edge of fear and hurt pride in his unremarkable eyes.

"Did he hurt you?" She asked Rocha.

"No." Rocha mumbled wiping tears from her face.

"If you so much as look at her again I will kill you."

The boy picked himself up and ran.

She turned to Rocha who could not meet her eyes. "What was that all about? Are you okay?"

"Just get off my back, okay? I'm not supposed to be talking to you." Rocha mumbled and Alex knew this was De Vries instruction to her.

"Why thank you Alex for rescuing me-" She mimicked. Her own tumultuous encounter altogether forgotten.

"I don't need anyone to rescue me." She snapped.

"Sure." Alex was chilled by the sudden memory of Cal standing as she stood now, his expression half sympathetic and affectionate.

Rocha shrugged delicately.

A crow cried out, the ominous sound echoed striking a chord deep in her chest. Alex whipped her head around trying to catch it in her sight but the crow had landed on a balcony high up on the mansion looking down at the two women with its head cocked inquisitively to one side.

"Alex, what is it?"

"This place isn't safe."

Rocha didn't protest, as if she had a sense of what Alex was talking about, the sinister shadow laying heavy upon them both. "We should get out of here." Alex whispered.

She shook her head as if to say, not again. "Where would we go?"

Alex looked at her and smiled. "I know a place."

As the two girls slipped out into the dark, further away from the sanctuary of the Day, Gage DeVries burst into the expansive drive of the Descourdres mansion, searching with an air of desperation for Alexandra Burrows but she was nowhere to be seen.


End file.
